


Small Cuts

by poorapothecaries (wanderlustnostalgia)



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, America's Suitehearts (Music Video), Angst, Attempt at Humor, Backstory, Cameos, Crack, Deleted Scenes, Drabble Sequence, Existential Angst, Existentialism, How Do I Tag, I feel like such a narcissist uploading this, I'm bored, Mental Health Issues, Minor Ryan Ross/Brendon Urie, Multi, Past Mikey Way/Pete Wentz, Short & Sweet, Snippets, Unrequited Love, Yikes, and i felt like sharing, it's good writing it just doesn't have a plot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-25
Updated: 2017-12-17
Packaged: 2018-11-19 00:23:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 8,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11301909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderlustnostalgia/pseuds/poorapothecaries
Summary: Snippets and scenes that didn't make it into any published fics.





	1. Now I'm Just Numb - Antivenom's Original Opening

**Author's Note:**

> I always keep the bits of my writing that don't make it into the final draft because a) sometimes it's actually well-written, b) I might reuse parts of it, c) oftentimes it contains headcanons that I might incorporate later on. Some of these will be deleted scenes from published fics, some will be original drafts, and some might be small snippets and sentences for fics that never ended up existing in the first place. Maybe they will someday. Who knows?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have six drafts of the story that eventually became Antivenom. Originally they were spies for a fictional agency titled FBR (yes, very creative, I know) and Patrick was trapped in a building during an explosion; rather than finding the cure for a poison, Pete's mission was going to be revenge on whoever was responsible (probably Sh*ne M*rris, tbh) and the fic would have flashbacks giving an idea of his relationship with Patrick and the rest of the team. That ended up being too complicated to plot out, so after many revisions we ended up with the published version of Antivenom (my current favorite child, the product of many hours of hard work). I do enjoy rereading the original snippets, though, mainly because I wrote them trying to figure out Pete's character/backstory so they tend to put a lot of emphasis on those aspects.

Pete Wentz is the first to admit that he is not an action hero.

He is also the first to admit that he has a job that may cause people to mistake him for an action hero, a job that places him in great danger more often than not and exposes him to the government’s dirty laundry on a regular basis.

If anything, really, he’s an idiot—a poli-sci major from Wilmette who not only stumbled upon a covert operation that culminated in a firefight outside the Richardson Library, but upon doing so, immediately slammed his textbook shut and decided _fuck midterms, I’m gonna shoot some bad guys._

He gets it—he really does.  He wears a lot of black and shit and knows how to kill people with guns, knives, bombs, hand-to-hand combat, and well-concealed poisons of varying strengths and colors.  He’s broken quite a few limbs, met with quite a few bad guys, been captured and tortured and nearly killed on several occasions, sustained bruises and concussions and has a left hand that still won’t quite close all the way and a foot he broke when he jumped off a building.  But he is not an action hero—far from it.

He is not an action hero because action heroes always save the day.  He is not an action hero because action heroes say _fuck the bureaucracy, I’m sticking to my guns and I’m sticking to what’s right._   Action heroes are ripped and handsome and play by their own rules, outsmart and outgun the villain at every turn, and almost _always_ get the girl.  Pete Wentz is not an action hero.

He is not an action hero because, as he is thinking this, he is glued to the edge of a chair in a surveillance van, biting his fingernails raw, face pressed so close to the computer monitor he can feel his retinas burning.  An action hero would be inside the building, but he is here, safely tucked away in this van, watching helplessly as one of his team—his _best friend,_ damnit—paces frantically around a small, dark room, searching in vain for a way out.

In the background, a computerized voice counts down from twenty.

Andy’s speaking through his headset, but Pete can barely make it out.  Beside him, Joe’s got his face buried in his hands.  Pete feels a lot like he’s in a first-person shooter game except the shooter went in unarmed and Pete has no control over his actions—or over the game’s outcome.

“It’s no use,” Patrick’s saying, voice tinny through the speakers of his headphones, and he’s trying to be calm, but Pete can hear his voice cracking, can hear the fear bubbling below the surface, waiting to break free.  “They’ve hid the bomb somewhere I can’t get to it.  I can’t get out, guys.  I’m trapped.”

_Ten…nine…eight…_

Pete’s taken enough history classes over the years to know that a single moment can change everything—can shape the course of history, for better or for worse.

_Seven…six…_

A shot to the back of the head in a Dallas limousine.  A nuclear bomb dropped over an island of innocents.  A plane crashed into a tower of people.  One moment—a singular moment, a fraction of a second…

_Five…four…_

“Patrick?  Patrick, can you hear me?”  Andy’s voice seems perilously close to breaking.  Joe’s hands are clenched into fists, eyes screwed shut, as he forces himself to breathe.  Pete’s throat closes.  He can’t bring himself to take his eyes off the screen.

_Three…two…_

“Pete?”  Patrick’s taken off his glasses and is staring into the camera lens, eyes wide and panicked, mouth taking in slow, shaky breaths.  Pete knows the expression on his face all too well, and it makes his stomach twist painfully.

_One._

“Patrick!” Pete chokes out.  “Patrick, I—”

There’s a deafening blast, a cloud of dust and ash, and the screen turns to static.


	2. Now I'm Just Numb - The Training Scene

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Basically an excuse for cameos. I don't actually listen to Waterparks; I was planning on having members of bands I actually do listen to show up elsewhere and so I'd run out of people to mention, so enter Awsten Knight, I guess. I apologize in advance to any Waterparks fans for his portrayal in this scene.
> 
> Also, more backstory! And Pete's friends being dead because who doesn't love angsting over past tragedies?

FBR training sessions take place in a large corporate boardroom where they used to hold briefings until the government decided that corporate boardrooms were inadequately equipped to handle meetings beyond a certain security clearance.  They are almost always taught by agents who are currently inactive in the field, usually ones who work desk jobs or have been placed on the DL while recuperating from injuries sustained on the job.

Most everyone in Pete’s division has taught a course at some point, including Pete, and while they all agree that it is perhaps one of the least glamorous or enjoyable aspects of their job, it's a necessity if they want to continue the legacy of consistently qualified agents.

Today the short straw seems to have gone to Hayley.  Pete’s still waiting on approval from the higher-ups for Operation Youngblood, and even though he knows Travie and Frank will come through for him in the end, all the waiting has left him anxious and tense.  It got to the point where he was pacing in the bullpen and Patrick, fed up, threw a pen at his head and told him to “go find something useful and productive to do or I swear to God I will rip off your dick.”

So now he’s here, lingering in the doorway of a boardroom that’s starting to fill with young, naïve, possibly bloodthirsty recruits waiting to find out what FBR has to offer them and possibly steeling themselves for a whole lot of disappointment.  If anyone asks, he can say he's offering moral support.  Not useful or productive, admittedly, but at least it keeps him out of Patrick's hair.

He notices Hayley up at the front of the room, swaying to and fro but leaning mostly on her good leg, wincing whenever she puts weight on her bad leg.  She shattered it a few years ago, and after reconstruction and several grueling months of physical therapy she walks with a noticeable limp.  Most of the time it’s manageable, and she can bounce between rooms with a spring in her step and a smile on her face.  Today seems to be one of her worse days, but she’s determined not to let it get the better of her.  She stopped using the cane her doctors gave her years ago, out of willpower and sheer stubbornness.

“All right, if you could all take your seats, we’re just about to begin,” Hayley’s saying, and when Pete scans the room again he’s startled to find it filled to capacity.  He looks back and Hayley’s staring at him with her eyebrows raised in a mixture of annoyance and bemusement.  He returns the gesture, flashing a trademark Pete Wentz grin at her, and she shakes her head at him before continuing, launching into the generic, practiced, and oft-used spiel about the illustrious history of FBR and the many ways the agency has saved the country, over and over again.  It’s a tired old speech, one that Pete knows mostly by heart even as it’s been revised and reworked to accommodate new operational successes, and one that he can hardly listen to without his eyes glazing over somewhere around the words “President Bush” and “in the wake of September 11th”.

Thus far, there have only been two—no, three people who have been able to make the training speech even remotely interesting:  Brendon, primarily because he goes off-book two paragraphs in because he gets distracted by a stray detail that leads him on a rant about weed or sex on the job or sex as a man with no feeling below his waist (which, okay, Pete did not need to know); Gerard, because he does his in pretty pictures to make up for his loss of speech; and _Patrick._

When Patrick teaches, he doesn’t just recite the speech off the paper—he tells a _story._   He tells the agency’s story, sure—in two, maybe three sentences if he’s feeling generous.  But he makes it very clear that it’s not about the agency, not about the job, but about the people he met along the way.  It’s almost like every grievance and complaint gets left at the door and he’s hawking a fraternity of weirdos with guns, and not merely a government agency; and his eyes always light up when he mentions that first mission, Operation Saturday, the one that solidified their partnership and cemented their status as a team.

Hayley, for her part, is trying to sound as cheerful and enthusiastic as possible, even as she grimaces through the pain that is undoubtedly coursing through her right leg.  Pete winces with sympathy, subconsciously attempting to close his left hand.  He makes a note to pick up flowers, pain meds, and a cup from that Thai ice cream place she loves for her desk later, especially because the crowd doesn’t seem to be appreciating her efforts.  He may be an idiot, but he’s also observant:  crossed legs, slouched posture, chairs that swivel far too often for concentrating listeners—all of these signal boredom.  It’s hard, especially as someone who thrives on attention, not to notice these things.

Hayley notices them, too, and towards the end of the speech she clears her throat and looks down, straightening her papers before laying them flat on the podium.

“Look, I’m gonna be straight with you guys,” she says, and Pete has to admire her patience.  “This job is hard work.  You are going to hate your instructor, your boss, your colleagues, your agency, and yourselves at some point.  You may lose family, your friends, even your lives.  No speech is going to persuade you to keep this job, so I’ll just say this:  it is hard work, but it is worth it.  I’m not just saying that because I was—”

“Top of your class in training?”

The interruption comes from a blue-haired kid sitting toward the front.  He’s leaned back in his chair, practically on top of the girl with the undercut sitting behind him, a cocky smirk on his face.  Pete kind of wants to smack him, but he also has to admire the kid’s tenacity.  He was like that, once—in some ways, still is, if Andy’s eye rolls and the numerous black eyes he’s gotten from Patrick over the years are anything to go by.

“We get it,” the kid says, swiveling in his chair.  The girl behind him looks ready to tear his nuts off.  “You were top of your class in training and you’re too good for this instructor bullshit.  We’ve only seen it in, I don’t know, every spy movie ever made.”

Hayley raises an eyebrow, cocking her head with that half-smile on her face that suggests both amusement and annoyance.  “Now—Awsten, was it?”

“With a ‘w’,” the kid corrects, and Pete snorts; what kind of hipster-y shit is _Awsten with a “w”?_

“Right, right, Awsten with a ‘w’.  Actually, I wasn’t top of my class,” says Hayley, and Pete’s actually surprised for a moment, until he remembers that no, she wasn’t.  And then he swallows, because he remembers who _was_ top of Hayley’s class.  “I was fourth,” Hayley continues, her smile starting to falter, “but that’s not important—”

“Wait, so who were the top three?” another kid (Pete recognizes him as one of his personal hand-picks, some bright-eyed, curly-haired kid named Max) pipes up from the back.

“Well, let’s see.  Smith was third, Urie was second—look, now I’m just wasting your time, the point is—”

“But who was number one?”

“You really wanna know who number one was?  Michael Way.  One of the original members of the Killjoys.  Kobra Kid.”


	3. Now I'm Just Numb - Patrick Character Study

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me trying to figure out Patrick's role in the team, still in the spy version of this AU. I decided he'd be the planner to Pete's executor, with Joe and Andy specializing in recon and ammo, respectively.
> 
> Featuring Patrick singing to Pete because I'm unoriginal, apparently.

There is no margin for error in their line of work.  Every plan has to be perfectly calculated, impeccably timed, right down to the millisecond; one small slip could make all the difference between life and death, normalcy and disaster.  Pete’s never liked that about the job—he thinks on his feet, in the heat of the moment, in the split seconds before his opponent pulls the trigger or throws the first punch, and acts accordingly.  He’s terrible at planning and even worse at math.

Patrick, on the other hand—Patrick is a perfectionist.  Patrick will stay up for hours, even days straight, poring over blueprints and surveillance footage and watching their target’s every move until building schematics and security systems are a part of him, ingrained in his mind.  Patrick will pass out atop his desk and when someone (usually Joe) prods him awake in the morning he will mumble timestamps or geographical coordinates with scraps of paper sticking to his chin before falling back asleep.

He’s great with timing, accounting for the length of each person’s stride, walking or running; the amount of time it takes for someone to speak when they’re in character; the amount of time it takes for someone to reload and under what circumstances they would use that last bullet.

“He does music,” Joe had mentioned to Pete sometime during their first two weeks as a team.  “That’s why he’s so good with timing and shit, right—he thinks of everything as one giant fucking song.”

But the musician thing has other benefits:  on long nights in hotel rooms, far from home, sharing a bed to save on space and money, when the darker side of Pete’s job starts to catch up with him and he finds himself reliving firefights and close calls and the deaths of his friends—all he has to do is whisper Patrick’s name and give him a nudge or two, and Patrick (after groggily trying to figure out what the hell is going on) will sing to him.  Anything Pete asks for.  His own personal jukebox.  He doesn’t use his iPod as much on missions anymore because it doesn’t give him the same comfort, doesn’t give him that same feeling of safety and security.  Patrick is all he could ever need, and all he could ever ask for.


	4. Drabbles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very short things I wrote.

_**an awfully big adventure (the easiest goddamned thing in the world)** _

“You know, I’ve thought about it,” said Pete.

“Thought about what?”

“The afterlife.”  He leaned over the railing, pausing to adjust his beanie.  “What happens when we die?  Do our souls move on without us?  Do they ascend to a higher plane?  Or do they linger around, trying to find some sense of purpose?  I mean, what is there for our souls to do if they don’t have a body to occupy?”

“Slow down, Pete,” said Patrick.  “I think the cancer’s starting to get to your brain.”

Pete shook his head.  “It’s not the disease—the disease has nothing to do with it.  I’ve always thought about it.  Like, what satisfaction do we get out of living?  We all end up in the ground one way or another.  Breathing’s just a way to pass the time until our hearts give out.  Talking’s just a waste of breath and living’s just a waste of death.”

“You’re thinking too hard.”

“Come on, ‘Trick,” Pete said, smirking.  “When have you known me to take the easy way out?”

 

_**stall me (break me in)** _

“You’re stalling,” said Pete.

“I’m not stalling _anything_ , Pete,” Patrick shouted from the middle stall.

Pete crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the wall.  “You say that, but I don’t think you mean it.”

“ _Go away._ ”  Damn, he was feisty.

“You’re not making this any easier, ‘Trick.”

“I’m not coming out.”

“I just want to talk to you.”

“You don’t understand.”

Pete pushed up and leaned against the stall.  “Then make me understand.”

Long pause.  Then a heavy sigh from the other side of the door.  “No, Pete…it’s not stage fright,” said Patrick finally.  “It’s worse…much worse.”

 

_**every lie they scrutinize (pete vs. the talk-show host)** _

He hated her.  Oh, he hated her.

Stupid Greta Feeney with her stupid blonde hair and stupid overbleached teeth and stupid ditzy laugh and stupid assertions.  How dare she—how dare she accuse him of “using” Patrick, “manipulating” his best friend—as if Patrick would ever allow that.  The very notion made his blood boil.

Patrick squeezed his hand lightly, and Pete made an attempt to suppress his indignation.  The last thing he wanted was Patrick waking up in the morning to see Pete arrested for assault and misconduct.

 

_**northern downpour** _

“Rough day, huh?”  The man at the counter is young and tall, with black hair that sticks up and droops down, thin, bouncy strands drifting down by his bright brown eyes.  He reminds Patrick a little of a puppy.

“You would not believe.” Patrick sighs, shaking his head, and pushes his glasses up.

“Well, hopefully, a drink will make it better.  What can I get for you?”

Patrick shrugs.  “What do you recommend?”

The man (“Beebo” on his nametag) furrows his brow.  He straightens his back and strokes his chin almost comically as he studies his customer.  If Patrick weren’t so exhausted, he would laugh.  “Hmm…you don’t seem like the espresso type…come to think of it, coffee doesn’t really suit you…”  He snaps his fingers.  “Northern Downpour.”

“Northern Downpour?”

“You strike me as a Northern Downpour kind of guy.”  He taps the counter and grins.  “On me.”

“Oh, no, you really don’t have to—”

“No, no, I insist.  You look like you could use a little cheering up.”

“Gee, thanks,” says Patrick, blushing.

“I’m Brendon, by the way,” the man says, “in case my nametag didn’t quite make that clear.”

Patrick smiles.  “Patrick.”

“You know, my boss would love you,” says Brendon, as he’s making Patrick’s Northern Downpour.

“Really?”  Patrick’s intrigued.

“Yeah, he’s been going through kind of a rough patch lately and if you could get him to stop being so brooding and shit, we’d all really appreciate it.”


	5. Letters and Journal-Like Things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My attempt at writing in the Pete voice (with a bonus Patrick at the end).

_march 30_

**_subject: as lonely as a little white church in the middle of the desert getting burned_ **

_hey._

_so right now i’m sitting in a room.  my nana’s room actually.  i have a lot of memories of this room.  there’s a headboard on her bed that has these really intricate carvings and they kind of look like two eyes and a mouth and it used to scare the shit out of me as a kid.  i might write a poem about it._

_it’s funny because the walls are eggshell white—you know, the type of white that’s not really white but it’s not quite cream either…just sort of this awkward off-white.  it reminds me of your nails and how you had them painted last week and they were just starting to chip.  of course your nails were more actual white and not eggshell white but you get the picture._

_see our relationship is a lot like eggshell—not really interesting or unique like cream but not perfect or consistent like white.  it just is what it is i guess.  it’s not a bad relationship, and we’re not bad people.  at least you’re not a bad person.  but we’re stuck in the same old rut and we’re not comfortable enough with each other for it to be enough.  we’re ok, but i want to be more than that.  i want to be more than ok.  i don’t want to be eggshell white, i want to be cream.  and i know i said i was ok with us but maybe i’m not._

_but what do i know?  they’re just walls._

_xoxo_

_pete_

**_subject:  so long and goodnight_ **

_you don’t understand.  i know you said you’d try to understand but you just don’t and you never will._

_see, when i said i was fucked up i fucking meant it.  i didn’t mean fucked up in the little cutesy way like oh i like to get naughty in random places or i’m a little weirdo lmao no i meant actual fucked up.  if you looked inside my mind you’d come out crying.  and if you had my mind you’d be writing this note too._

_i don’t regret what i said in the eggshell letters.  i also don’t regret any of the time i spent with you because you’re nice and funny and also pretty fucking hot but you have to understand sometimes i fuck up.  correction:  i always fuck up._

_i don’t think i can handle the pressure.  the band’s getting too big and we’re always fighting and pat won’t talk to me anymore and you always look at me like i’m crazy and i don’t want your pity._

**_subject:  progress report—i am missing you to death_ **

_right now i’m in portland.  portland’s motto is keep portland weird.  i don’t like portland._

_portland is not like la.  portland’s actually a lot like sf except less sports.  you’d like portland.  it’s very hipster._

_i don’t like portland.  portland does not have flash or glamour.  portland has books and coffee and food trucks and donuts and everything you can find in la but better.  it’s too real and it’s too quiet and no one knows my name and i can’t get lost in any distractions._

_i’m sitting in front of the biggest indie bookstore in the country.  they have a rare book room and part of me wants to eat up every word inside but part of me just wants to shove your body up against the brick wall and press my lips to yours and go for it, tongue against tongue against lip against teeth against you against me until we are one._

**_to:_ ** _patrick_

**_subject:  i miss you in the june gloom too_ **

_i like you._

_i like you a lot._

_i like you a lot a lot._

_i like you a lot a lot a lot._

_i like you a lot a lot a lot a lot and that’s not enough to emphasize just how much i like you because you’re perfect but you won’t admit it and that’s frustrating._

_i like you._

_but you’re perfect._

_and i’m fucked up._

_and experience dictates that we shouldn’t work because i’ve been with a lot of perfect people and that’s never worked out before but goddamnit you’re perfect and i ~~love~~ like you._

_it’d be too much to ask if you’d like me too.  i’m not a very easy person to like. we’ve known each other for too long and you know this already but i’m repeating it in case you get the wrong idea._

_i’m fucked up._

_you know the drill._

_xxxxpetexxxx_

**_To:_ ** _Pete_

**_Subject:  You’re a fucking idiot._ **

_You are the biggest asshole on the planet.  But if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be here._

_I don’t know why I like you, but I do.  Please don’t question it.  It will drive me insane._

_So, yeah.  I like you._

_You’re fucked up.  But I like you anyway._

_\--Patrick_


	6. Prompts and Requests?

Hi guys! Just wanted to let you know I will take any prompts/requests you guys have (no smut though, sorry dudes) and while I prefer to write Peterick and Ryden (also Lynn/Halsey, though I don't know how many people actually ship them), I am open to other pairings if you so desire :)

Thanks again for reading, and enjoy your week! <3


	7. Benzedrine (Sonnet for a Doctor)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot I had this. Companion piece to that one Suitehearts AU I started and haven't worked on since October (oops).

In a little house on the edge of town

Lives a doctor, a man called Benzedrine

With red lips pinched in a permanent frown

And a top hat stiffer than crinoline

He sits at his desk, in his lab, and works

On potions and poisons and pills and brews

And every so often, a man who smirks

Will drop in, shadowed and dark as a bruise

Pressing his lips to the doctor’s pale skin

And Benzedrine protests, _don’t break the rules_

But that grinning phantom, he always wins

The two of them mad as a pair of fools

For Benzedrine, though stoic and cold,

Finds Sandman ( _his Sandman_ ) worth more than gold.


	8. Suitehearts Drabble

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which I am very un-subtle about my political stances
> 
> (also sorry for the delay on Antivenom! had a bit of a plotting crisis and now i'm trying to find the motivation to pick it back up again yikes)

The day a mysterious orange man turns up in the Hills is the day everything starts to go terribly wrong.

He announces himself loudly, and his human name sounds remarkably similar to Donnie’s, but Sandman’s far too caught up in the strangeness of his appearance to pay any attention to his words.  He’s got squinty eyes, with skin the color of a rotten carrot and an unconvincing head of corn-colored hair, all packaged in a suit that reeks of freshly printed money and a tie the color of blood fastened round his neck.  He looks very much like a product of the River Avaritia despite supposedly coming from Normal Land and the people are drawn to him, drawn to his words and his ideas for reasons nobody can quite explain.

But Sandman can see the darkness spewing from his lips, emanating from him like clouds of smoke, fire and brimstone in his every syllable.  Sandman knows darkness—he is darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo if you like AUs and you wanna see some of 'em I've got a heckton up [here](https://www.wattpad.com/story/118933797-aus)


	9. The Best of Us - The Hiatus Fic That Could Have Been

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a lot of ideas for Patrick being bitter during the hiatus; the only problem is, I don't enjoy writing in canon-verse because I'm always afraid I'll screw it up--hence all the AUs. But character studies are _so fun,_ guys.
> 
> Also, like, the idea of Patrick being salty over people only respecting him when he's parroting people's words? HECK ME UP.

So here’s a myth:  there is no such thing as cynical happiness.

Patrick’s made an art form of it.  It’s his default mood, actually—cheerful façade, disillusionment as soon as he opens his mouth.

Here’s another:  Patrick only ever cleaned up other people’s messes.

 

\--

 

There are seven voicemails for Pete when he gets home.  One is from Joe, one is from a number he doesn’t recognize, and the other five—well.

With a deep inhale, and a throat that feels like cotton, he presses _play._

_First unheard message:_

_“Hey.  Hey you.  Yeah, yeah, you.  So listen, I’m at this fucking bar, this shitty-ass fucking bar—no, hey, hey, don’t argue with me, I love you but your bar is pretty fucking shitty—and I’m pretty fuckin’ wasted, but I just wanted to say—fuck, dude, stop that!—I just wanted to say—I just wanted to say fuck you.  And—and yeah, that's it.  Yeah.  Enjoy your shitty-ass life, 'cause I'm not in it."_

\--

 

The most common and dangerous misconception a fan could ever have is to assume that their idol is perfect.  It is all too easy to fall into this trap as a teenager, and it is even easier to fall into this trap if your idol’s name happens to be Patrick Stump.

(And before you ask, yes, he did write a song about this.  Whether it was a commentary or a warning, he won’t say, mainly because he’s not actually sure himself.)

Because it is so, _so_ hard to be perfect.  So fucking hard to live up to everyone’s standards, and so hard to be the person Pete can count on, the person everyone in the band can depend on.

(And by everyone, he really means Pete.  Andy’s the dependable one when it comes to the band as a whole, but Pete?  Pete he won’t touch with a ten-foot pole, even on good days.)

 

\--

 

_Fourth unheard message:_

_“Is that all I am to you, just some fucking puppet—some fucking ventriloquist dummy—and you’re supposed to talk through me?  Fuck you.  Fuck you and fuck everyone else, I have a voice too, I have_ feelings, _goddamnit.  Don’t you get it, Pete?—no, of course you don’t get it, you bastard, you dense fucking bastard,  you couldn’t get subtle shit if it was staring you straight in the face, could you?—I’m nothing without you.  Heh, ha-ha, ha—_ sniff— _it only took me, what—_ sniff— _eight tomatoes to the face before I realized it—_ sniff— _right in the fucking face, right there, I think I still have fucking tomato juice in my eye_ — _”_

\--

 

_Fifth unheard message:_

_“Shit.  Shit shit shit shit shit fuck shit fuck fuck—fuck, fuck, why, why—”_

\--

 

“Maybe I should get you a dummy,” says Pete.  “A ventriloquist’s dummy.  I’ll have it custom-made in the shape of yours truly, I’m sure I know a guy.  Somewhere.”

Patrick’s eyes refuse to open more than partway, so when he glares it’s not so much at Pete’s face as it is at Pete’s stomach.  “That,” he mumbles, “is the most self-aggrandizing bullshit I’ve ever heard from you.  And I’ve known you for over a decade.”

“A punching bag, then,” says Pete, because he’s Pete and Pete does not back down easily.  “It doesn’t even have to look like me.  You could just write ‘emo piece of shit’ and it’d be the same thing.”


	10. Victory's Contagious - The First Draft of the Hunger Games AU I Started Working On

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it turns out there is a surprising shortage of Hunger Games AU in this fandom and me, being me, decided that in addition to my 500 other AUs I might as well just tackle this one because why the heck not.
> 
> (I have soooooo many headcanons for this 'verse but like, when it comes to actually writing it...yikes.)
> 
> The initial versions of this centered on Pete; at the moment I'm switching the focus to Joe because he can give me more of an outsider perspective, I guess. Also in this version, Pete and Patrick are from the same district (Finnick/Annie-style); right now I'm having them as victors from separate districts (more of a Finnick/Johanna relationship) with Joe and Pete in District 5 and Patrick in District 6.

Courtney calls the name **_Patrick Stumph_** and it feels like a stab in the chest.

The worst part is, Pete can’t do anything about it.  He can’t scream, and he can’t cry, and he sure as shit can’t volunteer, not when this is his second time watching the reaping from the other side of the stage and most everyone in the Capitol, if not everyone in Panem, knows his name.

No one volunteers, which is expected—District 5 is hardly Career territory, after all.  And yet Pete still has to dig his nails into his palms to contain his resentment, his anger toward all the teenagers in the audience who are standing there stupidly, staring and breathing sighs of relief that they’re not the lambs being put out to slaughter.

Fucking _cowards,_ all of them.

Pete’s heart is pounding in his chest.  His face is hot and his skin is tingling and his stomach is churning.  This wasn’t supposed to happen.  Not to Patrick.  Nothing was supposed to happen to Patrick.

“District 5, I give you—your tributes!” Courtney proclaims, waving her hand with a dramatic flourish.

Patrick’s shaking next to her, in a sweat-stained shirt with the sleeves rolled up that used to belong to his dad, and he looks far, far too small.

 

{…}

 

Patrick was the last one to see him, after the reaping.  Pete’s mom and dad and siblings had all filed through, given him hugs and kisses and wishes for luck (though the looks on their faces had said, plainly, they didn’t think he had a chance in _hell_ of making it), until the very last person left standing in the doorway was the stocky boy from the bakery with the gray cap on his head.

“’Trick—” Pete started, but he didn’t get any further before Patrick hugged him, tight and bone-crushing and nearly suffocating with its force.

“Don’t die,” Patrick choked out, burying his face in Pete’s shirt.  Pete drew him closer, rubbed small circles on his back.  “Don’t leave me, you hear me, asshole?  Because—‘cause if you leave—if you—you—”

“Shh,” said Pete, and for a moment the walls of the Justice Building faded away, and it was just the two of them, occupying the same space, together, as one.  “I’m not gonna leave you, ‘Trick, I promise.”

Patrick sniffled.  “On your life?”

“On your _mom’s_ life,” Pete said, smiling when he drew a watery chuckle.

When it came time for them to pull away, Patrick’s eyes glistening and his hair damp against his skin and a Peacekeeper lingering menacingly in the doorway, Pete said quietly, “Just—promise me you’ll do one thing for me, Patrick.”

Patrick wiped at his eyes with the back of his hand.  “Yeah?” he whispered.

Pete tossed him his notebook and smirked.  “Write me a song.”

 

{…}

 

After dinner, Pete catches Patrick staring out the train window, palms splayed against the glass as he watches tall metal buildings and orange sunsets blur by them with wide-eyed, rapt fascination.  It’s Patrick’s first time seeing it all, of course, and the wonder and beauty in his eyes make Pete’s heart _ache._

“You know, it’s prettier from the outside,” he says.

“Really?”  There’s the hint of a smile on Patrick’s face, so gorgeous Pete feels something in him shatter at the sight of it, at the thought of what’ll happen to that smile in a matter of days.  “Prettier than back home?”

Back home, sunsets were dull, clouded and marred with thick gray smoke, but there was always something— _real_ about them.  Something tangible, almost.  Here in the Capitol the smoke is gone, the colors are brighter, but that feeling, the one of being able to reach out and grasp the sky, hold it in your own two hands—that feeling is gone.

“Well, no, but—but.”  Pete scratches at the back of his neck and Patrick watches him, curious.  “I don’t know, they’re—they’re, oranger, I guess.  Oranger?  Orang-ier?”  He waves dismissively.  “Whatever, more orange.”

“Right,” says Patrick.

Pete takes a tentative first step forward, then another, and another, slow and cautious, like if he moves too quickly or too hard the ground will crumble beneath them and swallow Patrick whole.  After about five seconds, Patrick sighs impatiently and climbs down from his perch, patting the spot next to him for Pete to sit.

“You know, last I checked, you had a way with words,” Patrick says, brow furrowed, arms folded over his chest like a challenge.  “Or did the head trauma mess with your artistic genius?”

“Please,” says Pete.  On impulse he reaches out and pushes Patrick’s glasses up his nose, tucks a stray strand of red behind his ear, lets his hand linger on Patrick’s cheek before withdrawing.  He smiles, tight-lipped, rueful.  “You know I never had much genius to begin with.”

Patrick shakes his head, places a hand over Pete’s and squeezes, lightly.  “I’ve got a notebook full of lyrics that says otherwise.”

They stay like that for a while, fingers intertwined, and as Patrick starts to nod off Pete presses his lips to Patrick’s forehead, feather-light.

“No, ‘Trick,” he whispers, closing his eyes.  “That was all you.”

 

{…}

 

In the Capitol, at the interviews, the night before his Games, Caesar asked him, “Is there anybody watching you back home?  Family, friends, a girl, perhaps?”

Pete laughed, boyish and braying and coupled with his widest, most obnoxious grin.  For someone who lived in a District devoid of them, playing to the camera was one of his greatest strengths.  “Actually, I do have someone,” he said, and the audience gasped collectively and leaned forward, like they were being let in on some huge secret.  “I won’t name names, but they know who they are, and they’re the prettiest motherfucker in Panem, and I’m gonna win this for them, and then they’ll be stuck with me forever but that’s okay, they love me as much as I love them.”

While the audience moaned and Caesar scolded him for being a tease, several hundred miles away, Patrick tugged his cap over his eyes and hoped no one could see him blush.

 

{…}

 

Patrick comes back from group training with bruises on his knuckles, and when they ask he shrugs and tells a scandalized Courtney and a bemused Mark that he was training with one of the dummies and hit it the wrong way.  Pete calls bullshit, and after dinner he drags Patrick up to the rooftop and stares him down until he confesses.

“I punched a Career in the jaw,” he says.

“You _what?_ ”

Patrick rolls his eyes and throws up his hands, which really only pisses Pete off more.  “Oh, so _you’re_ the only one allowed to pick fights with Careers, I see how it is.”

And yeah, Pete got into it with the Careers a couple times, but it never escalated beyond taunts and shoving matches, nor did it involve anyone getting punched in the jaw.

“Hey, don’t fuck with me, man.  I’m the one making sure you come home to your mom in one piece.”


	11. All Together Now - The Stupid High School AU I Started and Never Finished

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for not updating, guys, I've been focusing on trying to get the next chapter of my Hunger Games AU out and I had a couple plotting crises regarding Antivenom but I really wanted to get something out, so I dug through my scraps and, well, here we go. Cliche high school AU snippets. (Apologies to any Swifties who read the last section.)
> 
> (Also, Patrick and nosebleeds? Based on a true story.)

**_5 dollar nosebleed_ **

Patrick always manages to get nosebleeds at the least convenient times.

Sometimes they’re not that big of a problem—sometimes they’re the kind he can sniffle back down, or wipe away with a tissue borrowed (well, _taken;_ Joe is _very_ particular about that distinction) off of Vicky or the teacher’s desk or something.  More often than not, though, they’re gushers, uncontrollable streams of blood that stain his clothes and his hands and leave streaks on his face that he always forgets to wash off because, well, hygiene is the least of his priorities.

But—for Christ’s sake, in the middle of a fucking _French test?_

“Joe,” he whispers, hand held up to his nose, because Joe’s the only one in his French class he remotely trusts with anything regarding his personal health.  If he ever looks up, that is.  “ _Joe,_ ” Patrick says, slightly louder.  The girl behind him shushes him and he rolls his eyes, resisting the urge to turn around and say, “Look, I’m Carrie,” with crazy eyes and blood dribbling down his chin.

It’s at the point now where he can taste it in his throat, and that _really_ sucks, and he knows you’re supposed to lean forward and _pinch,_ but what’s the point of that if he doesn’t even have a tissue and it’s gonna leak all over his fucking French test—

“Trohman!” he hisses loudly, and thank _fuck,_ Joe looks up.  Finally.

“Dude, what the hell—holy _shit_ ,” Joe says, eyes wide as saucers.  “Fuck, dude, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, I just need a tissue,” and like the dependable friend he is Joe immediately starts searching his pants pockets and his backpack for a Kleenex or something, but fate or Lady Luck or whoever’s in charge of Patrick’s life right now seems to be against him, because he comes up empty.  “Shit, sorry, dude,” he says, looking forlorn.

“ _Gentlemen,_ ” Madame Calhoun says in warning.

Patrick shakes his head and tells Joe, “It’s fine,” and then still trying to be as discreet as possible he glances at Madame’s desk (no tissue box, what the _fuck,_ what kind of teacher doesn’t have a _tissue box_ ) before slipping out of his seat and walking as casually as he can out the door to the bathroom.

 

**_all together now_ **

Pete and Patrick are fighting.  Again.

“You don’t get to decide what’s best for _my fucking band,_ Pete,” Patrick’s shouting, face flushed red.  Several orchestra stands have already been knocked over.  His hat is upside-down on the floor.  It’s astonishing Pete’s made it this far without sustaining a black eye.  “I don’t care if you’re the fucking captain of the soccer team, I don’t care if you’re fucking Captain America:   _my_ band, _my_ rules.”

Pete’s standing there impassively, arms folded over his chest.  He looks mostly serious, but his eyes are gleaming with mischief.

“Guys, we should probably do something,” Lynn whispers.  There’s a group of about ten of them crammed into the storage closet watching the whole scene play out.  Ashley’s pressed so close to her back she might as well be on top of her.

“Nah,” says Brendon.  “Fighting’s like foreplay with these two.  Give it thirty seconds.”

Ryan, from the back:  “Twenty-five.”

“Wanna bet?”

“Shh!”  Hayley shakes her head; her leg bumps up against Lynn’s as she moves.  “Fifteen,” she mutters, handing Brendon three twenties, “if it’ll shut you up.”

“You are such a piece of _shit,_ ” Patrick snaps.

“Yeah,” says Pete, leaning in, closing the space, “but I’m _your_ piece of shit, remember?”

A beat.  Silence.  Patrick glares at Pete, nostrils flared, eyes hard and angry.  And then—

“Ha!  Pay up, fellas.”

Brendon and Ryan groan.  “I don’t have any money,” Brendon whines.

“Then you and Ryan have to switch clothes for a week.”

“ _What?!_ ” Ryan exclaims, and Ashley smacks him on the leg to shut him up.

“You couldn’t have had us, like, strip naked in public or something?”  Brendon’s voice is disturbingly pleading.

“Okay, first of all, ew,” says Hayley, “and second of all, the public’s seen more than enough of Brendon Urie to last a lifetime, and third of all, _ew._ ”

“Plus you’ve already stripped in public,” Spencer points out.  “Twice.”

Brendon gasps, mock-affronted.  “And just what are you _insinuating,_ Spencer Smith?  That I, Brendon Boyd Urie, have no sense of honor or boundaries?  Or that you, Spencer James Smith, are a disgusting pervert?”

“Wow, throwing out that sophomore vocab word,” Spencer deadpans.  “I’m surprised you even remember sophomore year, considering you slept through most of it.”

 

_**keep my jealousy close ('cause it's all mine)** _

The thing about fake-dating Taylor Swift is that it’s a lot like actually dating Taylor Swift, in that a) you are almost always with or in the general vicinity of Taylor Swift, because she’s kind of clingy like that; which naturally means b) you eat and hang out with Taylor Swift’s friend group on a regular basis, as a way to assimilate and also a show of what Taylor calls “feminist solidarity”, and because Taylor only hangs out with the popular people this means c) you yourself are now, by way of connections, a popular person; so d) you are subject to a lot of attention (negative and positive) whether you like it or not.

(There’s also that whole e) thing of unintentionally abandoning your other friends, specifically the people you used to eat lunch with and more specifically Lynn Gunn, who wears black and plays hockey and has no place at Taylor’s table, but that’s beside the point.)

The point being:  _everyone_ is talking about Ashley Frangipane.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "The Last of the Real Ones" will singlehandedly save 2017 and nobody can tell me otherwise


	12. One-Sentence Fics for the Soul:  FOB

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote these earlier this summer and honestly idek

**_ex-friends till the end_ **

It becomes an unspoken rule that summer:  no one speaks of Pete and Mikey when Patrick is within earshot.

 

**_drunk on rosewater_ **

There are rules for these kinds of things—rules that clearly dictate angels and Reapers are not to interact in any way, let alone fantasize about the softness of each other’s skin and the perfect curve of each other’s lips, their fingers tangled in each other’s hair as they crash and burn into each other over and over under the cover of dusk.

 

_**you're a vegetable (they eat off of you)** _

“Just call me Pete-tato,” said the spud, who bore an emo fringe and (if Patrick’s already very-confused eyes were to be believed) smudges of eyeliner.

 

_**i think we've had enough** _

Andy ended up grounding them both to the tour bus when it turned out Pete’s shampoo had been swapped out for Aunt Jemima’s pancake syrup.

 

_**sittin' on a rainbow** _

“Oh, what a world, oh what a life,” sang Patrick, the grin on his face bright enough to blind anyone within a two-mile radius, “I’m in love.”


	13. High School AU, Part II - Peterick Angst

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Working on updating Antivenom but until then have this cliche-as-shit high school Peterick snippet
> 
> (I honestly only posted this because I saw the words _paso doble_ while I was going through my drafts and thought "huh that's a pretty good line")

**_falling apart to half time_ **

Two important, interdependent events occurred Patrick’s freshman year of high school that would go on to define his entire adolescence:  one, he joined the GSA, and two, he met Pete Wentz.

He met Pete Wentz at GSA, as a matter of fact.  Pete was a junior, he played soccer, he went to middle school with Joe, and, as he informed the rest of the club at the introductory meeting, “I’m an honorary board member—no, really, this club couldn’t function without me, just ask our treasurer, right, Mikey?”

(To which Mikey, the aforementioned treasurer, rolled his eyes, and Gerard, the club president, laughed sarcastically before threatening to throw Pete out.)

From these meetings, Patrick had gathered two things:

1) Pete Wentz was an asshole with no filter, and

2) Pete Wentz was really.  Really.  Hot.

Hotter than anyone else Patrick had ever met, in fact.  Which, naturally, led to the third realization:

3) Patrick Stumph was not straight—at least, not as straight as he thought.

Pete flirted with him, too.  Maybe a little more than he flirted with everyone else, although that could’ve just been Patrick’s overactive, hormonal imagination.  Most everyone else responded with either joking reciprocation (Gabe, Joe) or heavy-handed, deadpan rejection (Andy, Gerard), but Patrick—Patrick always felt his insides double-knot themselves and his pulse quicken and his face flush fifty different shades of red whenever Pete walked by him, tousled his hair, pressed a quick smack to his forehead.

It wasn’t a serious problem until Pete got a girlfriend.

She was Patrick’s age, pretty and petite and giggly and generally everything Patrick wasn’t.  Things got serious, and pretty soon Pete started bringing her to meetings, which meant the playful tease, the push and pull, the _paso doble_ that had defined Patrick’s Thursday lunch periods for the better part of a year was over.  He started sitting in the back corner, right behind Gabe, just so he wouldn’t have to watch Aimee or Ashlee or whatever-her-name-was play with Pete’s hair and drape herself all over him like a cat with abandonment issues.

It was around this time he met Anna, and after several exchanges in the hallways that could, conceivably, be construed as flirting, she asked him to homecoming.  Any other guy would’ve worn this like a badge of honor, something to be envied or even praised (dating not one, but _two_ grade levels above your own—and one of the _popular_ ones, no less—that was a fantasy most boys at their school didn’t dare touch), but if Patrick was being honest with himself he couldn’t have cared less about the invitation.


	14. Now I'm Just Numb - Scraps

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Procrastinating again (update or homework? you decide)...anyway here's some stuff that sounded cool when I wrote it but had no place in the story :D

His gut is churning wildly, his stomach and heart doing backflips in perfect, even synchronicity.  A weird, terrible sort of melody, but Pete’s used to it.  It’s the song of his adrenaline, played in the key of fear and anxiety; it has been the soundtrack to his life for nearly three decades.

 

 _Back in the old days, back when they were new on the job and still learning how they fit together as a team, nobody really knew what they were doing.  They were sent on minor jobs as recon, scouts, with the boring job of listening and learning and taking notes and reporting back to their superiors the information they had gathered so that the older agents like Frank and Gerard and Ray and…_ those guys _could go out and do all the cool shit that involved guns and disguises and blowing things up._

_If they weren’t recon, they were bait—a diversion, a distraction to lure in the real prey.  Patrick hated being the bait, although perhaps not as much as Andy, who managed to lose a girlfriend on Operation Sixteen Candles, one of their first real operations._

_It was Operation Suitehearts where things started to go wrong._

_Their cover was blown, along with the building they were in, and when they managed to escape it was with Pete slung over Patrick’s shoulders, two bullets in his chest and blood marring the bright white of his T-shirt._

_Legally, he was dead for seven minutes.  A short time in the span of someone’s life, a blink in the span of eternity, but a lifetime in the moment.  Pete wasn’t conscious, but sometimes he can imagine the broken looks on his friends’ faces._

_He drifted in and out of consciousness for about a week or so, not quite ready to face the world in his new, fragile state (he’d only recently begun to surrender his bravado in favor of real courage, a task that had proved more monumentally difficult than he’d originally thought), and when he finally resurfaced Patrick’s face was staring down at him.  A few days later, when they’d taken him off the ventilator and he could speak and shift without the world shaking in his vision, Patrick punched him in the shoulder.  Hard._

_“That’s for dying, asshole,” Patrick said.  “I waited a week for you to pull through just so I could do that.  Don’t get hurt.  I’m the one who has to clean up your messes, remember that.”_

_Pete didn’t say what he was thinking—that Patrick was all too willing to clean up Pete’s messes.  He had a feeling Patrick didn’t want to be reminded._

 

“You know what bothers me, ‘Trick?” Pete asks.

“Besides homophobes and corduroy pants?” Patrick deadpans.  He’s got his business face on, jaw set.  Pete could easily break his frown in a few words, but getting Patrick to smile isn’t at the forefront of his mind right now.  “What bothers you, Pete?”

“Diamonds,” Pete says.  When Patrick doesn’t respond, he elaborates:  “You wanna know how diamonds got a reputation for luxury and romance?  This British imperialist, Cecil Rhodes, found a shit ton of them in South Africa and thought, hey, I could get rich off of this, so his company launched this whole marketing campaign.  Diamonds are a girl’s best friend and all that bullshit.  But there’s nothing romantic about imperialism.  It’s blood money, plain and simple.  Even vampires have better ways of showing love.”

 

A neighbor found the victim in her apartment, having come by to drop off some mis-delivered mail; he saw the body through the peephole.

(“They should make that their motto,” Hayley quipped upon hearing it.  “ _The United States Postal Service:  we make every fuck-up count._ ”)

 

One of the downsides (or perks, depending on how you look at it; Pete’s seen it both ways) of working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation is that there is no such thing as a typical day at work.  Some days, Pete’s getting shot at by drug traffickers with semi-automatics; others, he’s sitting at his desk filling out paperwork and fighting off a hand cramp by throwing crumpled-up sheets of notepad paper at whoever’s closest (Trohman, usually; he has a feeling Andy would kick his ass if he tried).


	15. Sneak Peeks (might delete)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo this is partly to apologize for procrastinating, partly to reassure you that I am, in fact, working on updates, and partly to promote my new [Tumblr](https://poorapothecaries.tumblr.com/) (which will mostly be fic-related stuff, so feel free to follow it).

_**antivenom** _

Pete had almost forgotten about the Gabe theory.

Before meeting with Lauren, he’d stopped by Gerard’s to see if facial recognition had pulled any hits; there was a resemblance to Gabe, but also to five other guys—and that’s just in Chicago.  Now, driving back from the café, he’s convinced that initial burst of recognition was a false positive, conjured by sleep deprivation and any leftover adrenaline from—well, yesterday.  He should know better.  Hunches are dangerous in their line of work, especially where strong emotions are involved.

But if there’s anything Patrick’s taught him, it’s that there’s something to be said for trusting your gut.  Pete has a complicated relationship with his instincts, but thus far, even before he knew anything about Patrick and Lauren and the McEnroe case, they’ve been right about everything.  And as he pulls into the parking lot, all the questions he’d been asking himself since Brendon first showed him the sketch are starting to resurface.  He doesn’t quite know what to make of it except it feels a lot like that night at the bar, Patrick’s smile telling one story, Pete’s incorrigible intuition feeding him another.

So when he gets Joe’s text, telling him to head straight to Brendon’s office, he doesn’t think twice about the tugging feeling in his stomach, doesn’t question the doubt and uncertainty and _dread_ jostling for prominence in his brain.

He listens.

He runs.

 

**_let the flames begin_ **

Nothing happens in District Five.  So says the Capitol; ergo, it must be true.

The reality isn’t that simple, of course.  Five isn’t a model district, any more than Pete and Andy’s crew are model citizens.  It just knows how to keep its head down, is all.  It cloaks itself in productivity and buries its ambitions in unflinching obedience, and is left untouched by the Capitol in return.  The fires burn low without anyone to stoke them; the temptations nag and pull but remain unacknowledged.  Five keeps its head down, does what it’s told, and nothing more; thus it survives.

There are, of course, exceptions.

Pete Wentz won his Games because he didn’t keep his head down.

(Alternatively:  Pete Wentz lost his Games because he _couldn’t_ keep his head down.)


	16. Yule Shoot Your Eye Out - Christmas?? (feat. Petekey)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (alternately titled: I started writing a thing, rewrote the thing 788899 times, then decided to publish this because I felt bad about not being able to keep it in)
> 
> This is probably the only thing Petekey-related you'll ever get from me, unless I get my shit together ~~and run away never see any of you again~~ and finish the Hunger Games AU.

Mikey Way was gone.  Not dead, just gone.  One minute his sharp-edged bones had been carving divots in Pete’s mattress and then the next he was pulling away,  lips still swollen with Pete’s touch, and he was shaking his head and saying with apologetic eyes and as much emotion Pete had ever heard in his voice:  “I can’t do this anymore.”

Pete, stunned, had frozen in the sheets.  “What do you mean,” he asked.

“This,” Mikey said, like that would explain everything.  “I can’t—” He looked down at his hands, which had fallen limp from Pete’s shoulder, and sighed shakily.  “I can’t be what you want, Pete.”

Pete's fingers tightened around the sheets.  “You don’t know what I want,” he said, but the words were quiet, barely audible over the rustling as Mikey shifted.

“I know a lot more than you think,” Mikey said, and there was a beat, and then he stood to leave.

“Don’t go.”   Pete’s voice was strangled.  “Please.”

Mikey stilled, turning to face Pete.  His eyes brimmed with tears.  “I’m sorry,” he said, and then—he was gone.


End file.
